Pretoria - Deputy Minister of Environmental Affairs, Barbara Thomson, has urged all South Africans to step up efforts to protect the country’s biodiversity for the benefit of the present and future generations.
“Our vast wealth of biodiversity, our variety of life from genes, species and ecosystems offer a suite of natural solutions in the face of unemployment, rising poverty levels and climate change,” Deputy Minister Thomson said on Friday.
She was speaking at the launch of the Environment Sector Local Government Strategy as part of the International Day for Biological Diversity (IDB) celebration’s in uMgungundlovu District Municipality, KwaZulu-Natal.
Some of the benefits offered by the biological diversity included protecting areas from soil erosion, providing food security, medicinal products as well as reducing the risk of local and global climate change.
“The strategy will propel government initiatives aimed at advancing sustainable development projects in South Africa as these are implemented at the grassroots level,” department spokesperson Albi Modise said.
The Local Government Support Strategy provides a platform for a more coordinated and structured mechanism of dealing with sustainable environmental management in local government.
Modise said the department in partnership with various entities was running several biodiversity initiatives aimed at solving water security challenges and promoting sustainable development in the catchment areas of the Municipality.
The initiatives included the “Save the Midmar Dam” Project and the WESSA “Working with Traditional Leaders in the uMgeni Catchment Programme”.
“This area has also attracted various international projects focussed on biodiversity and climate change adaptation through making use of Ecological Infrastructure for poverty eradication and improvement of livelihoods,” he said. – SAnews.gov.za
